Thoughts on Jonathan Meades 'Zaha Hadid: the first great female architect'

have no idea how this is going to turn out. I'm not going to respond to anything specific, just give my thoughts as they flow through my fingers into the keyboard. Maybe I'll cover one point, maybe all 10. Here goes....

I can see Zaha's problem with historicism. I don't think the attitudes of Krier and his ilk are easy for her to comprehend; she is totally and only expressive, bold, emotional. To look back is to restrict her creative 'soul'.
However, Zaha talks of doing a city "without looking backwards" and try as she might I don't believe this would ever truly be possible. There is no darkness without light, there is no forwards without backwards.
In addition, Meades describes each of her buildings as being "sensitive to its context". I can totally believe this, even if "it's not a question of taking a cue from her immediate surroundings". It's more abstract than that.
It's this abstraction that she is reluctant to talk about, a stubbornness that leads to her apparent lack of architectural eloquence. As Paul mentioned in class, she's being very clever. I bet she could explain every nook and cranny of her buildings and why a surface bends this way or that, but she is being secretive, she doesn't want us to know her methods. I would go so far as to say she likes, even loves playing the architectural enigma.

I do like her though.